Vegan Chinese New Year

Maybe it’s just me, the ultimate seeker of novelty, but I get full on excited at the thought of getting up close and personal with something new. This Chinese New Year, I’m stepping into previously unknown territory and exploring the vegan possibilities in the world of Chinese food.

Before anybody points it out, I know that “Chinese food” is kind of a ridiculous generalisation because China is enormous and has a gazillion different cuisines within it – what I’m really talking about here is our Westernised version of the stuff, anything you can find by glancing at the takeaway menu.

Vegan Chinese takeaway

According to the PETA guide to vegan takeaway, most Chinese restaurants have plenty of tofu knocking about in the kitchen, and the majority of their meat dishes will have tofu equivalents. So if you are into the soy vibe, ordering a Chinese takeaway should be pretty much plain sailing. Their vegetable dishes should be safe (steamed or stir fried veg, crispy seaweed) as should their plainer noodle and rice sides, but double check before ordering just in case. Oh, and spring rolls. Spring rolls are usually totally cool. I recommend reading the One Green Planet guide to Chinese takeaway too, it covers all imaginable bases.

Sweet and Sour Tofu

I adapted this from Ching’s Chinese Food in Minutes. Sweet and sour is one of my favourites because, you know, pineapple. Her recipe uses pork which is omitted here for obvious reasons and replaced with tofu. She also recommends (optionally) adding brown sugar which I wasn’t totally into, so I’ve skipped that too. I’m not sure if I’m 100% sold on tofu yet, I’ve read a few articles in a few places (some reputable, some less so) about it being not the best possible thing to put in your body, and I can see how that would be plausible. Also, it’s very nothingy. I think I might have preferred to just put an extra vegetable in there, you know? It’s a learning curve. We’re all learning and curving together out here.

cooked rice to serve (Ching recommends egg-fried, but we’re skipping that in the name of doing the whole vegan thing for the day)

Slice tofu into bitesize chunks – about the size of halloumi bites, you could say. Heat about a tablespoon of oil in a frying pan and let it sizzle for a good few minutes either side until golden brown and crispy. Set aside on some kitchen towel.

Give the pan a wipe round (or, use a wok instead) and heat a little more oil – you wanna go high heat at this point, it’s Chinese cooking after all.

Add the ginger and pepper chunks, stirring with some urgency to ensure the ginger doesn’t catch, cook for two minutes. Add the pineapple (juice and all) and bring to a bubble. Season with the tamari and vinegar, then add the blended cornflour and stir to thicken.

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3 Comments

Tofu is HUGE out here, whilst I realise I’m not in China, there’s huge Chinese influence, um, everywhere. I’ve been told on countless occasions out here that tofu is the vegetarian chicken and it tastes like it too… not convinced haha. The problem with tofu from UK supermarkets is that it’s not very good for frying, and can fall apart easily. Perhaps try grabbing some from an Asian supermarket, they’ll probably have more varieties, and you can ask which is good for frying. That could be a load of old sh*te but that’s what we’ve been told x